This is an e-mail interview I did with Paul Thorn, winner of the Regional in Munich. I hope it motivates some of you guys out there to get actively involved in the tournament scene.

Hi Paul! For me you came like out of the nowhere. Now you have won the Regional in Munich. Being the first of 12 players doesn‘t sound like that a great achievement compared to other tournament games but you were ahead of players in that tournament that did quite well in the last European Championship in Liege. 

How long have you been playing Call of Cthulhu?

nice!! and congrats paul on the win. i will add that winning a regional of 12 players sounds much more impressive than winning my regional of 4 players!!

its also great to see some new talent emerging. i, like paul, have never played CCG's / LCG's before CoC and only starting collecting 4 months ago. so to all new players, feel heartened that a complete set / experience does not necessarily equate to victory. i think magnus stated somewhere that it's coming down to play ability these days so just practice, practice, practice till your eyes bleed!!

mischraum.de said:

Very cool idea and interesting interview!

And congratulations again to Paul :)

bye

Konx

The tournament was great, thanks to Ulrich.  All of my opponents were very good players.

I don't mean to be rude by I didn't find this interview to be informative or helpful at all. It was never mentioned once what he won with? What did his deck list look like. Why did he play what he did? 

Yes i'm agree with kamacausey

Congrat to Paul Thorn, but how he make this deck? what is the deck list?

kamacausey said:

Personally, I think it's stupid, but I respect the decision.

Thats fine. I respect that decision as well but why waste time with a useless interview? To just get a public "atta boy!"? Stupid imho.

Even if we don't get lot of information, it's always good to talk about tournament, winner and co ^^

I have a lot of respect for Ulrich, but I have to agree with Kamacausey. But it is still true to the title of the thread as it is just an interview with the regional winner.

Its the kind of biographical info that could have been put in someone's forum profile that people could read if they are interested in that person. An entire thread dedicated to such info doesn't really serve any purpose, but apparently some people find it interesting.

This info is a bit interesting, but someone being a prodigy or bringing experience from other games isn't unheard of so i don't feel this "everyone with small pool can be a champ" theme. Other than that i don't see much content.

And this secrecy is puzzling me. This no scouting rule, now decks going not public. Is this a real problem? For me it seems unenforceable and makes getting info even more important as its harder to get. And for establishing meta its good for ideas to flow between players. I'm not sure how it will look when all is secret… or its limited availability and made public after new cards are released so its harder to just steal fresh ideas?

.Zephyr. said:

Decks not going public was a direct reaction to the addition of the 'scouting rule'. As one of the participants at the German Regional stated: "I'll insist on enforcing this rule just to show everyone how stupid it is."

I think, the thread discussing the scouting rule can still be found on this forum.

jhaelen said:

I could have swore I have seen numerous people deliberately not discussing and or witholding their decks lists years before the scouting rule was even brought up.

Being a secret sally about decklists is nothing new to this game. Deck list secrecy is a long held and huge bug bear of mine. If you cannot win a game without surprising an opponent with a decklist, then you are not a very good player in the first place.

But I can see the scouting rule making deck list secrecy even more prevalent with players. Yet another reason to rail against the scouting rule.

Again, counting on the worst in people never yields positive results.

I dont get this rule, maybe not whole decklist, but cards like Benath the myre i think you should tell your opponent about so he plays accordingly, its just too huge a swing in a really stupid way to get with such a thing. Hack journalist is also pretty stupid if you don't expect him and don't keep something that can get him, but here at least its generally a good thing to do to having some kind of character control and hes voulnerable to very many control effects. And stuff like my Yog-Shub with a lone hacker just cause i can shocking transform him/opening the getes him, not much hint until you lose some random story. Not sure how viable it would be in a better deck but it sounds extremely nonsense to surprise with such cards.

But maybe the idea is that its too easy to just still the deck when you have full decklist publicly available… idk

 Deck secrecy was around years and years before the no scouting rule. The community can't reasonably complain about a no scouting rule when the community has a long history of trying to keep deck tech secret.

A player insisting on enforcing the rule strictly to show how stupid it is is cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Like all unsportsmanlike rulings it only comes into play when a player makes a charge of it. No one decides to complain the TO has no reason to take action. It is just another tool giving players and TO's control for what kind of tournament they want to have.